I'm a geochemist. In the past ten years I've fixed mass spectrometers, blasted sapphires with a laser beam, explored for uranium in a nature reserve, and measured growth patterns in fish ears, and helped design the next generation of the world's most advanced ion probe. My main interest is in-situ mass spectrometry, but I have a soft spot in my heart for thermodynamics, drillers, and cosmochemistry.

Saturday, November 28, 2015

There are numerous critiques, both onlineandintheliterature (pdf), of the overused H-index and journal impact factor (IF) metrics,
particularly when it comes to assessing the quality of recent research.However, many of these critiques do not
include suggestions for how to improve the situation, aside from pointing out that if h-index equals half the square root of total citations, then it is a redundant number.Over in Economics, they have gone all out to
make a fantasy economics league, but we dirt people have no such
construction.Here, then, are a few
easily calculated stats that would be an improvement on the status quo.The can be calculated using Google Scholar,
if necessary, assuming anyone knows how to yank their numbers.

COIF: Citations over Impact factor.

This is the number of citations per year a given paper has
relative to the impact factor of the journal. Impact factor/2 is the average
citations per year of a journal for papers in their first two years of release;
subracting that from the citations per year for each given paper gives each
paper a score. averaging those for a researcher gives their score.

This metric puts the particular work of a scientist into
perspective relative to others who publish in similar journals. Of course, the COIF from
someone who publishes in journals with IF of 20 is not comparable to that of
those who publish in papers with IF of two, but if IF is going to be tied to
individual researchers despite all admonitions against this practice, then COIF
gives a way to interpret it.

I suspect that most young to mid careers scientists will
have a positive COIF; citations, at least in geology, tends to accumulate more
in later years than in the first two.However, a declining COIF might mean that one's work is becoming less
relevant as time goes by.

Whether an institution wants a person with low COIF and
flashy journals, or a high COIF in esoteric publications probably depends on
the particular institution, and what their priorities are.So the COIF might even be useful for
determining how well suited people are to various particular institutions.

As an industry person who publishes occasionally, I have few
enough papers to be able to calculate this for myself manually and easily (using Google scholar, which probably inflates the numbers by 20%).
Anyone with a basic knowledge of programming could probably automate the
process, though.

Paper

year

Journal

IF

CPY

COIF

Birch et al.

2007

AJES

1.6

1.8

1.0

Parsons et
al.

2008

Am Min

2.0

4.3

3.3

Klemme et al

2008

Geostandards

3.2

2.9

1.3

Parsons et
al.

2009

CMP

3.5

3.3

1.6

Aleinikoff et al.

2012

Chem Geol

3.5

7.7

5.9

Magee et al

2014

SIA

1.2

1.0

0.4

Mean

3.5

2.2

SCP: Self citation percentage

What percentage of a paper's citations come from authors of
that paper? This is simply The number of times a paper is cited by one or more
of its authors divided by the total number of citations. This has been looked
into by a number of people in the never ending struggle to interpret citation
numbers.At least some suggest that the
number in generally in the twenties, and doesn't have enough variant to be useful,
but I find that surprising, as the papers I've published vary quite a bit:

Disclaimer:

All opinions, measurements, figures, and facts on this page are the personal opinions of Charles W. Magee, Jr, and do not represent the views of any of his employers: past, present, present-but-about-to-be-past, or future. None of the content herein has been subject to peer review, and should be treated with caution or derision. Any passing mention of OSHA code violations, criminal activities, unethical or unscientific behavior, or the clandestine Australian nuclear weapons program are fictions created to make rhetorical points, and do not represent the reality of my, or anyone else's, workplace. Do not attempt any scientific protocols described herein at home, with the exception of the chocolate chip cookie recipe. Do not apply the products of that protocol to individuals with heart disease, diabetes, high blood pressure or cholesterol, egg, wheat, dairy, or chocolate allergies. Do not view this blog continuously for more than 45 minutes without stretching and taking other precautions to prevent computer-related chronic injury.
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